Sharepoint site - how to reduce it's size - compaction?

rogerfinch 

If you have already emptied the recycle bins and optimized your files as much as possible, and the size of your SharePoint site has not reduced as expected after turning off versioning and deleting old versions, here are a few additional steps you can take:

1. Check Versioning Settings: Ensure that versioning is indeed turned off for all document libraries in your SharePoint site. Sometimes, versioning may still be enabled at the list or library level, even if it's disabled at the site level. Double-check the versioning settings for each list or library to confirm that it's disabled.
2. Verify Deletion of Versions: Confirm that all versions of documents have been deleted successfully. While you've deleted versions, it's possible that some versions may still be retained due to caching or replication delays. Monitor the site for some time to see if there are any changes in the size of the site.
3. Run SharePoint Online Management Shell Commands: You can use SharePoint Online Management Shell commands to analyze and optimize the storage of your SharePoint site. Commands like Invoke-SPOSiteOptimization can optimize site storage by removing unneeded files and reclaiming space. However, be cautious when using PowerShell commands, as they can have significant impacts on your SharePoint environment if not used correctly.
4. Consider Migrating to a New Site: If reducing the size of your existing SharePoint site proves to be challenging, you may consider creating a new SharePoint site and migrating only the necessary content to the new site. This can help start fresh with a smaller and more optimized site structure.

Please, keep in mind that changes to the size of your SharePoint site may not be immediately reflected due to caching and replication mechanisms in SharePoint Online. It may take some time for changes to propagate and for the size of the site to update accordingly.